


brand new sun

by abeillle



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-24 15:35:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7513753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abeillle/pseuds/abeillle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Draco Malfoy vs. Yorkshire.</p>
            </blockquote>





	brand new sun

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Author_Chan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Author_Chan/gifts).



> Happy Birthday, Ginny!!!!!!!! Before I knew that you were planning on writing this, I did it for you. Hopefully you don't mind. I know you wanted cavity-inducing fluff, but I'm allergic to happiness, so I threw in some light angst.
> 
> Actually, I started off following your original prompt to the letter, but then I belatedly realized I could never finish it. I threw in an OC and several metric tonnes of weird shit and now I don't know who's driving the car.

_ The Daily Prophet, June 22, 1994 _

_ Malfoys to lose custody of son  _

 

_ Following a three-month trial at the Supreme Wizarding Court, judge Marlise Kennan has ruled to deprive Lucius Malfoy and his wife, Narcissa, custody of their only son. Draco Malfoy, a third year student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, was purportedly mistreated by his family in a manner that the judge found “sufficiently detrimental” and “abusive.” The investigations surrounding the Malfoy family began in March, when school administration observed that a boggart faced by Draco as part of the standard curriculum had taken the form of his father. Following this incident, the department of Criminality and Justice uncovered multiple instances of unacceptable behaviour in the Malfoy clan. Upon the advice of school headmaster and council advisor Albus Dumbledore, Draco’s custody will be given to a member of staff, who wishes to remain anonymous. Lucius Malfoy has declined the opportunity to comment. _

 

...

 

The ministry car, which had been driving through the tangled lanes of a small town in England, stopped suddenly in front of a cottage. 

“Here we are,” said the driver, failing to conceal the interest in his voice. The bungalow was run-down, and quite small; yet the boy in the backseat was none other than the son of Lucius Malfoy. In the passenger seat was Remus Lupin. Although Remus Lupin was in some ways more important in the sequence of events than Draco, the driver payed him little attention; after all, one does tend to follow the whereabouts of affluent families with a keener interest than ageing professors.

“Thank you,” said Lupin, with a sort of weariness. “It’s been more and more difficult to find wizard drivers over the recent years.”

“Not a problem,” mumbled the driver. He remarked that the Malfoy boy didn’t thank him, but he wasn’t especially surprised. 

Lupin bid adieu to the driver and stepped out of the car to hoist Draco’s trunk out of the back. Draco, standing behind him, took it wordlessly from his hands.

“Was it really necessary to take a car?” demanded Draco, making a show of stretching his legs. He resorted to snappy remarks when uncomfortable. “Muggle machines are so primitive, it took  _ ages _ .”

“It was a matter of security,” Lupin said briskly. He glanced at the black car as it turned a corner and disappeared. He motioned towards the cottage. “It’s not much, but you needn’t mind, since you’ll be at Hogwarts most of the year.” 

Draco stared intently at the wilting flower-beds to avoid having to answer. He had already in his mind a plethora of scathing remarks about the dilapidated cottage, but once Lupin had admitted to its faults, saying them would no longer give him any satisfaction. Suddenly irritable, he made his way up the driveway without pausing to see if Lupin was in tow. His trunk clattered over the uneven pavement. He felt strange carrying his own trunk, rather than having one of his father’s servants do it for him. 

Lupin, apparently unfazed, followed Draco to the front door. He took from his briefcase a dull brass key, which took him several attempts to jam into the lock. Finally, he managed to turn the recalcitrant knob and open the door. 

The inside was shabby, but tidy. The entrance, which was merely an afterthought tacked on to the living room, consisted of a row of brass hooks and a small mat onto which shoes were lined in neat pairs. In the living room were two burgundy armchairs arranged around a small wooden table. Dozens of copies of  _ The Daily Prophet _ were stacked in a magazine file beside a metal stand, on which stood a boxy, archaic radio. There was no fireplace in sight.

“You can leave your coat on a hook,” said Lupin pleasantly, as if he welcomed students to his home on a regular basis. “You room is just up the stairs, to the left. I can help you with your trunk, if you need it.”

“I can do it myself,” said Draco. He intended to say it in a condescending way, but the words came out wrong: too soft, almost apologetic. To compensate he purposely knocked one of Lupin’s tatty jackets off a brass hook as he hung up his coat. Then he grabbed his trunk and stomped up the stairs.

There wasn’t much furniture in his new bedroom. It was empty save for a desk, a dresser, a bookshelf, and a bed. All of the furnishings looked secondhand. The place was a broom closet compared to the old bedroom he had at home - although he felt strange referring to the Malfoy Manor as _ home _ . This horrible, ugly place was  _ home  _ now. Everything felt surreal: he was holed up in some shack in Yorkshire with  _ Remus Lupin _ , who, as of nine that day, had become his  _ sole legal guardian _ .

Draco collapsed on the bed. Life officially made no sense. 

 

…

 

Draco awoke an indeterminable time later to the far-off hum of machinery and the more imminent clatter of dishes downstairs. At first he panicked at the sight of his surroundings, but soon the strange, shabby room became familiar to him once more as he recalled what had happened earlier. He lay in bed and wondered what had happened to his chambers at the Malfoy Manor. Perhaps his mother had kept them intact, in the hopes that he’d someday return? Perhaps not? He could imagine his former bedroom stripped of its green and silver hangings and tacked up photographs, transformed into a guest bedroom or a storage closet. The thought of it made him queasy. He slipped out of the bed and peered out of the tiny window in the hopes that he might calm himself down. The view was nothing compared to that of his former floor-to-ceiling French windows, which opened out onto a balcony overlooking the scenic gardens of the manor. From Lupin’s he couldn’t see much besides rows of dumpy little cottages, with vegetable patches and clotheslines and unkept yards full of wildflowers. Was this really all there was to the English countryside?

He shut the window and veered into the hallway on the second floor. There was only one other room; a quick peek inside revealed that it was a bathroom. 

Draco made the mistake of catching sight of his reflection in the small mirror - his hair was dishevelled and his clothes were rumpled. What would his father think? His mother? As if it mattered; Draco might never see them again. He wasn’t sure whether or not he was supposed to be upset about this. He supposed he’d be fine without his father, but he missed his mother terribly. Why couldn’t the two of them have run away from Lucius together? Draco always took it for granted that she’d put him before her husband. 

All of the sudden the awful, cold truth stood before him, as he stared into the bathroom mirror: he’d been betrayed. His mother had left him for the wolves. Draco began to cry. 

Almost immediately he felt ashamed. He was too old for such displays of childishness. He decided to distract himself somehow. He ran a towel beneath the lukewarm tap and mopped at his face. He straightened his clothes and brushed his hair with his fingers until he looked somewhat presentable. Then he went downstairs.

He found Lupin in the kitchen, frowning over a pot of soup. He supposed the kitchen was shabby, but he had nothing to compare it to; he never once set foot inside the one at Malfoy Manor. It looked sort of homey, Draco supposed, with rows of pots and pans and bushels of herbs hanging above the wooden counters. He wondered if Lupin had a house elf. 

“Good evening, Draco,” said Lupin, snapping him out of his thoughts. “Dinner’s almost ready. Have you unpacked yet?”

“No.” Draco didn’t offer any explanation. He was suddenly afraid that Lupin had heard him cry.

“You can do it after dinner,” said Lupin. He ladled the soup into bowls, which he placed onto a small wooden table. Draco realized that he was ravenous. He couldn’t remember when he had last eaten. He sat down and stared awkwardly at the food, suddenly unsure of what to do. His father always got angry if he forgot proper etiquette at meals, but now everything was different. 

“Tuck in,” said Lupin, sitting down opposite from him. 

They ate in silence. The soup was good; Lupin was a decent cook. He wondered if his parents could cook. Probably not. They had servants to do it for them.

He worried a dent in the table with his thumb, and wondered, not for the first time, just how jarring this whole thing was. He was struck by a wild thought: he wasn’t sure if he should be angry or grateful towards Lupin. 

Also, he was worried that Lupin would make him cook. He wasn’t sure how to admit that he’d never stepped foot in a kitchen before in his life.

 

…

 

“I've never stepped foot in a kitchen in my life,” said Draco. For good measure, he added: “And I don’t mean to start now.”

“That’s fair,” said Lupin, with a wry smile. He was chopping vegetables, without magic, strangely. Draco could see the beginnings of a chicken pot pie coalescing on the counter ahead of him. “Let’s start tomorrow, then.” 

“I don’t understand why I even need to learn how to cook,” muttered Draco. “I’ll just get married and make my wife do it for me. You just chop up all that crap with magic and toss it in a pot. It’s what house elves are for.”

“You’re not going to get a wife with that sort of attitude, so you can forget all about it. Not to mention, as a member of this household, it’s your responsibility to cook from time to time. The best way to learn is by doing it by hand. It’s tomorrow or today, the choice yours.”

“Today,” said Draco with a sigh. He fetched an apron from the cupboard. Lupin gave him a battered cutting board, a knife, and a few scraggly carrots. 

“Think of it like preparing a potion,” he said in his professor voice. “Chop the carrots in half, then cut them horizontally.”

“Yeah, yeah,” said Draco, and almost lost his thumb a minute later.  

“Don’t rush,” muttered Lupin, emptying a bag of frozen peas into a saucepan. He turned on the stove and pried the knife from Draco’s hand. 

“Hold it this way,” he instructed, positioning the knife in Draco’s slack palm. “Now turn your fingers inwards - no, on your left hand - there, that’s good - get your thumb out of the way -”

Lupin placed his hands over Draco’s and maneuvered them into position. Draco froze.  

“I’m sorry,” said Lupin, retracing his hands, but after dinner, studying his hands in the bathroom mirror, Draco realized he didn’t mind.

 

…

 

Halfway through his first week at Lupin’s, Draco decided to explore Yorkshire. His father wouldn’t dream of letting him wander around a muggle town, to mingle with such undesirable people, but Lupin was unfazed. 

“Don’t be out too late,” he said while Draco laced up his shoes. “And leave your cloak at home; it’s out of the norm to be wearing one here.”

So Draco walked along Hebden road, feeling odd without the familiar weight of his cloak and robes. There wasn’t much to see; he passed by a woman hanging laundry onto a clothesline and a couple of old men who glared at him from a wooden porch, but other than that he was alone. 

Eventually, he wound up at a shopping plaza. It was a squat building made of reddish brown brick. The roofs were sunken in, and the concrete of the parking lot was crisscrossed with a web of cracks. There were only a few open stores - a laundromat, a grocery, a chippy, and what appeared to be an antique shop. 

Draco eyed the grocery store warily. On one hand, his father would die of mortification if he saw Draco do business at that sort of store. On the other, Lupin had given him a bit of muggle coins as spending money, and the grocery was bound to have candy.

The candy won out. Draco stepped into the store, which was pleasantly cool despite the heat of the day. Had muggles found a way to alter the temperature? Draco was almost impressed. He passed through aisles of wilting vegetables and canned goods, only stopping when he found it: the candy section.

He was hopelessly lost. Where were the chocolate frogs? The Bertie Bott’s? He was overwhelmed by unfamiliar names: Crunchie, Kinder, Tic-tac, Hershey's, Aero. His first impulse was to buy the lot and try everything, but then he remembered he had little money. Twenty pounds, Lupin had told him. Less than a galleon. He chose a chocolate bar at random and brought it to the cash register.

The clerk, a boy about his own age with dark brown hair and square glasses, rang up his order. 

“That’ll be two pounds,” he said. Draco, forgetting which coins were which, fished a handful of them out of his pocket and placed them decisively on the counter. The cashier frowned and started picking through the change, sorting it out. He was nervous all of the sudden, as if the cashier might suspect him of being a wizard. He kept his eyes on the row of cigarette boxes behind the counter as the boy counted out change. 

“Twenty pence is your change,” said the cashier, sliding a few coins towards Draco. Then, as if struck by a sudden impulse, he added: “I like Aero bars, too. They’re my favourites, although my sister swears by Hershey’s.”

“Yeah,” said Draco, intelligently. 

“Are you new around here?” asked the cashier. “I’m Elliott, by the way.”

“Draco,” he replied. “And, yes. I mean, yes, I’m new here. But I’m only staying for the summer.” Why was the muggle boy talking to him? Why was Draco bothering to talk back? 

“That’s too bad,” said Elliott. “But if you want, we can hang out while you’re still here. My shift ends at eight, we can play video games or something.”

Draco wondered what video games were. Fraternizing with muggles was heresy in his father’s mind, but Draco wasn’t thinking about any of that: for once, he was struck by something akin to a tiny spark of curiosity. It threw open the mental floodgates behind which he so carefully kept all his questions. He wanted to ask Elliott why the store was cold and what a Hershey’s bar tasted like and how many pence there were to a pound. He wanted to know what video games were.

“All right,” Draco found himself saying. “I’ll be there at eight.”

 

…

  
  


_ List of things to ask Elliot: _

 

 

  * __What is internet__


  * _Who is Pillsbury Doughboy_


  * _What is a lawn sprinkler_


  * _What is a spatula_


  * _What kind of animal is “Pikachu”_


  * _^ Does it live around here?_


  * _^^ Is it dangerous?_


  * _^^^ Why do you talk about it so often?_


  * _Who is Barbara Streisand *..._


  * _Why does the pencil sharpener at the library hiss at me_



 

 

_ … _

 

A few weeks after Draco’s arrival in Yorkshire, Lupin offered to help him decorate his room.

“I know you had your room in Slytherin colours before,” said Lupin. “We can go buy some green and silver paint. Also, some photographs came in today, from your mother.”

Slytherin, photographs, mother. With a pang, Draco realized that his new room was, in fact, completely bare. He had a muggle photo of himself and Elliott hidden away in some drawer, but he was wary about pasting it up. 

Draco opened the envelope and removed a wad of assorted photographs: Crabbe, Goyle, Padma, and his friends from Hogwarts featured prominently, smiling and waving. He flicked through them with growing malaise: would they still all be friends the next school year, what with Draco’s exile from the Malfoy’s? He hoped so. He missed all of them, even Crabbe. 

One photo stopped him in his tracks. It was the very last one, jammed into the stack sideways as if his mother had added it in as an afterthought. His family started up at him from the glossy paper. Lucius was almost expressionless, but Draco fancied he could see an almost imperceptible smile on his mother’s face.The photo was quite dated, his parents looked younger, and he himself was a baby, adorned in a tiny set of emerald robes. He held on to his mother’s robes with a tiny, chubby fist.

Draco shoved the photo into the drawer, alongside the polaroid of himself and Elliott. He didn’t mention it to Lupin, and when the paint had dried and he was arranging the photographs onto the wall with scotch tape, he didn’t paste it up. It remained in the drawer until a few months later, when he cut Lucius out of the photo, and then a few months after that, when he cut out his mother, leaving only his child self, gaping at the camera. There was a certain satisfaction in snipping away his parents’ faces. He put up a photo of himself with Lupin, instead.

 

…

 

Dear  ~~ Lupin ~~ Remus,

If you’re reading this that means I’ve graduated and that I finally mustered up the courage to give this letter to you. Actually I’m writing it in 1996, at the kitchen table at midnight. I’m supposed to be finishing my Potions essay. You’re too busy being a werewolf though to reprimand me for not having done my Christmas break homework sooner. I know about the werewolf thing, by the way. I was scared at first but I guess I’m okay with it. Ron let it slip by accident, but you must promise not to get cross with him. He had  ~~ a whole bottle ~~ too much eggnog at Christmas dinner. 

I think I had too much eggnog too, or else I’d never write such a letter. I’m not really sure why I’m writing at all. I might be tipsy.  I guess I just remembered Christmas at the Manor and how it was always  ~~ pollitic ~~ political. I felt like an outsider in my own dining room. I was always an afterthought to them, probably. I didn’t realize it because they always gave me such nice gifts. But money was nothing to them. Last year when Mrs Weasley gave me a sweater I thought it meant she didn’t care. But now I realized it means she cares more than my father and mother ever did all their lives. I think caring is something everyone has in different amounts. No, it’s something people distribute in different places. My parents cared about money and class so they didn’t have any left over for me. But Mrs Weasley cares and you care and so did everyone at that Christmas party. And that’s why I’m writing this letter. I want to say thank you for  ~~ loving me ~~ being the first person to care.

Draco

 

…

 

Dear Father,

I’m doing well. My grades at school are looking up. I think I’d like to become a potions master when I graduate. I know you wanted me to go into ministry work, but it’s not something I’d go very far in. I’m not sure if I’m angry about everything that happened. I think forgive you, but I won’t ever forget.

Draco

 

...

 

_ The Daily Prophet, May 6, 1998 _

_ Remus Lupin remembered by friends and family _

 

_ One of the countless tragic heroes of the Battle of Hogwarts, Remus John Lupin, as well as his wife, Nymphadora Tonks Lupin, fell in honourable battle on the second of May. Remus Lupin was a former teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, beloved by his students and respected by his colleagues. His sons Edward and Draco are the last surviving members of the Lupin family. Draco Lupin (formerly Draco Malfoy), who was adopted by Remus following the Malfoy scandal of 1994, remembers his late surrogate father as “honest, loyal, and stronger than anyone [he] knew.” Draco, as well as former student of Remus, Harry Potter, have organized a wake in honour of Remus and Nymphadora. It will be held at their former home in Yorkshire, on May 21. _

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my various friends who I fused into a single entity to cameo as a grocery cashier; to Jason Lytle, whose song I used as the title; to Richard, for only complaining slightly while editing this; and most importantly, to Ginny, for being such a great friend. Happy Birthday!!!
> 
> PS. I was going to write an extra chapter of gratuitous Draco/Elliott smut or something, because Ginny deserves to be happy, but upon realizing that I based Elliott off my friends I decided against. Sorry, Ginny. Maybe next year.


End file.
